


you've been out a while

by greeksalad



Series: fingertips stained with hope [1]
Category: Avatar: Legend of Korra
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern with Bending (Avatar), Domestic Fluff, F/F, Fluff and Humor, Kid Fic, Light Angst, alternate title: kya and lin adopt a trash baby, but its so mild its barely even there
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-10
Updated: 2020-07-10
Packaged: 2021-03-04 17:53:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,904
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25190437
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/greeksalad/pseuds/greeksalad
Summary: Kya finds a baby. Lin is not impressed.
Relationships: Lin Beifong/Kya II
Series: fingertips stained with hope [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1824820
Comments: 33
Kudos: 243





	you've been out a while

**Author's Note:**

> this one goes out to the kyalin discord B)
> 
> also this was supposed to be a drabble and it ended up being almost 2k words so clearly that didn’t go too well for me

It was a beautiful night in Republic City. Overhead, the stars twinkled brightly, reflecting into the calm waters of the harbour and highlighting the waves with silver. The air was pleasantly cool, and there was just the slightest of breezes, giving Kya the perfect excuse to press herself up against Lin as they walked. (“It’s a bit chilly,” she’d said, as if she hadn’t spent the last few years in the South Pole.)

For quite possibly the first time in her life, Lin had _left work early_ so she could take Kya out to dinner, and, after a lovely evening, they were taking a stroll along the waterfront, making idle chatter as they did.

Or rather, they had been.

“Kya _,_ ” Lin called, planting her hands on her hips. “What on _earth_ are you doing?”

Kya looked up. She was knee-deep in a pile of trash bags, and there was a piece of lettuce tangled in her hair. “ _Shhh_ ,” she said, and held a finger to her lips. “I thought I heard something crying over here.”

Lin frowned. “Crying? Why would-“

From somewhere within the pile of trash, there came the faintest noise, like a choked-up wail.

Kya started pushing the boxes and trash bags aside with renewed vigour (looking fairly deranged, but Lin loved her regardless), until she suddenly gave a triumphant cry. “Yes! Lin, I found- _oh._ ”

As Lin stepped closer, Kya knelt down and carefully lifted up what looked like a bundle of blankets.

“Lin _._ ”

The blankets shifted and made a gurgling noise.

Lin eyed it suspiciously. “What is it?”

Kya raised her head, and Lin was startled to see a kind of horrified sadness on her face. “It’s a _baby,_ ” Kya murmured. “Someone left a baby in the trash, Lin.”

Instinctively, Lin took half a step back. The word _baby_ tended to trigger her fight or flight response (more specifically, the latter.) “Uh. Maybe put it back? It doesn’t belong to us; maybe the parents… lost it?”

“Babies don’t belong in trash piles, Lin,” Kya said. “I doubt any decent parent would accidentally leave their kid in one.” Stepping deftly over a stack of boxes, still carefully cradling the baby in her arms, Kya moved further into the light of a streetlamp, and Lin got her first proper glance at the kid.

It was a small thing; Lin didn’t know much about babies (or anyone below the age of sixteen, for that matter), but she didn’t think they were supposed to be that small – malnourishment, maybe? Peeking out from under the blanket was a tuft of dark hair and one _tiny_ hand.

“We can’t just leave it there,” Kya said, looking over at Lin with big, beseeching eyes.

Lin sighed. “I know. The hospital should still be open; we can drop it off there.” She gently laid a hand on Kya’s arm. “It’ll be in good hands there.”

Kya bit her lip. “Lin… the hospital’s all the way of the other side of the city, and it’s late, and it’s cold. Wouldn’t it be better if we-“

Lin knew exactly where this was going. “Kya, no.”

“Please?”

“ _No._ ”

\--

“I still don’t understand how I ended up in this situation,” Lin grumbled.

Kya laughed. “Don’t worry, it’s just for tonight, my love. Tomorrow, we’re taking her down to the hospital first thing – I promise.” Kya pressed a kiss to the top of her head. “Now, can you watch her for a second? I need to go heat up some milk.”

Lin eyed the squirming baby lying on their couch. “I- okay?”

“Thank you!” Kya called, already halfway to the kitchen. After a second, there came the sound of the fridge being swung open, its contents rattling around violently, and then the sound of the element clicking as it heated up. 

The baby kicked its legs and blinked big, crystalline blue eyes at Lin.

Lin stared right back.

“Ooga,” said the baby.

“Kya?” Lin called, not taking her eyes of the baby for a second.

“Yes?”

“It’s making weird noises.”

Kya’s amused grin was evident in her voice. “It’s a _baby_ , Lin. They all make weird noises. Try talking to her; it’s good for their development, or something like that.”

Lin looked at the baby distastefully. “Hello.”

The baby gurgled happily and grabbed its feet.

“How are you today?” Lin tried. “Well, I guess not that great, seeing as you got left in a trashcan.”

“Guhhhh,” the baby said, and Lin couldn’t help but agree.

\--

Lin woke up to the sound of crying.

She always slept lightly anyway, but, honestly, how could anyone sleep through that racket? It sounded like a car alarm crossed with a screaming cat.

Well, apparently Kya could sleep through it.

Lin propped herself up on her elbows and glared silently at her wife, as if that would make her wake up. Kya could probably sleep through an earthquake; in fact, she had. Twice.

After a lot of internally grumbling, Lin finally accepted that she would have to go deal with the kid. (Did they have an off switch, like an alarm clock? Was that how that worked?) “You owe me _so many_ sexual favours for this, Kya,” Lin muttered under her breath.

Throwing on her dressing gown, she stomped out into the living room. “Right. What do you want?”

The crying didn’t abate; if anything, it got worse.

Lin groaned and moved over to the corner of the room, where they had set up the old crib that Rohan used to sleep in when Kya was on babysitting duty. “How do I make you shut up?” Lin asked, looming over the crib and glaring (albeit fairly sleepily) down at the kid.

At the sight of Lin, the crying died down a choked hiccuping noise, which was less annoying but somehow more heart-breaking.

Maybe it was because she was tired, maybe because the baby just looked _that_ pathetic, but, in a truly shocking twist of fate that even Lin hadn’t seen coming, she reached down and scooped up the kid.

She awkwardly gripped it under the armpits and held it out in front of her. “Are you good? Can I go back to bed?”

The baby’s sporadic sobs started to deteriorate back into full-on screaming again. “Oh, _spirits_ ,” Lin groaned, and tried to cradle the baby the way she’d seen Kya do earlier. “Uh, there, there?” she said, patting it uneasily on the back.

By some miracle, the baby quietened somewhat, now only letting out the occasional sniffle and hiccup.

Lin paced around the room, bouncing the baby in her arms and saying random words to it in a vaguely soothing tone in the hope that it would _shut the fuck up._

The problem, though, was that when she put the baby back in the crib and tried to make her escape, it started screaming at the top of its lungs again.

Lin picked the baby up again.

It stopped crying.

She put it down.

It started wailing.

 _Goddamnit,_ Lin thought.

\--

“Please don’t pull my hair.”

The baby gurgled happily and didn’t let go of its fistful of Lin’s hair. 

“Brat,” Lin said half-heartedly.

The baby beamed.

After going through the put-it-down, pick-it-back-up process about fifty (read: two) more times, Lin had unhappily accepted the fact that she was going to have to stay up until the stupid baby fell asleep. They’d ended up on the couch, with Lin reclining against the armrest and the baby propped up on her chest.

Said baby was apparently determined to kick Lin in the stomach as hard as it could. “ _Stop,_ ” Lin hissed, reaching out and grabbing one flailing foot. The kid seemed to take that as a challenge and tugged hard on Lin’s hair. “Ow, _fuck_. Spirits, are all babies this aggressive?”

“Bababa,” the baby said and face-planted into Lin’s collarbone. It had thankfully let go of her hair; now its hands (how could anything physically be _that_ small?) were fisted tightly in her shirt, and it had finally stopped kicking her, though its feet kept restlessly shifting around like it was still considering it.

(She was pretty sure it was drooling on her, too.)

In a very uncharacteristic moment of weakness, a surge of protectiveness flooded through Lin's chest. How could it just... trust her? It didn't even know her, and yet it seemed more than happy to take a nap with its face buried in her neck.

Lin thunked her head back against the armrest, supressing a groan, and prepared to wait until the baby went to sleep. It was going to be a long night.

\--

Lin blinked awake as the first rays of sunlight hit her skin. “Mmmph… _oh my god._ ”

There was a baby lying on her chest.

_She’d never put it back in its crib._

_She’d fallen asleep on the couch. With the kid._

“Morning, sleepyheads.”

Lin looked up to see Kya standing over them, looking incredibly smug. She groaned. “Kya, this isn’t what it looks like.”

“Mhm.”

“She just wouldn’t shut up, so I got up and tried to make her be quiet-“

” _Mhm._ ”

“-except I accidentally fell asleep and– stop making that noise! You know what, I don’t need to explain myself to you.” Lin looked away as haughtily as she could with a baby dribbling on her shoulder.

Kya looked delighted. “You called her _she._ ”

“Huh?”

“You called her _she_ instead of _it._ ” Kya’s eyes danced with mischief. “Admit it. You’re emotionally attached.”

“Am not,” Lin retorted.

“You literally have your arms wrapped around her right now.”

Lin glared at Kya. “That’s just so she doesn’t fall off. It proves nothing.”

“Uh huh. _Right._ ”

They stared at each other for a second, before Kya’s teasing expression faded into something a little more serious, and she dropped to her knees beside Lin. Her hair was loose, flowing down her back in long silver waves, and Lin couldn’t resist reaching out and burying her sleep-slow fingers in it, tugging gently.

There was a pregnant pause, as warm and slow as the morning sun.

“Lin,” Kya said softly. “Do you want to keep the baby?”

Lin hesitated. “I- I don’t-“

Kya reached out and covered Lin’s hand, which was splayed protectively over the baby’s back. “It’s okay if you do, you know.”

Lin stared at her, helpless. “I- Kya, I’m so busy, all the time. We both are. I don’t want to…”

_have my child to feel like i’m too busy for her._

_be like my mother._

“It’s okay,” Kya said again, smiling softly at her. Lin felt strangely like crying. “It’d be okay, Lin. Katara’s moved in with Tenzin, so I have a lot less on my plate, and I know Mako’s dying for a raise.” She squeezed her hand. “We can make this work, if you want it to.”

Lin didn’t say anything, just stared at their intertwined hands. Her and Kya. Her, Kya, and the baby.

Kya squeezed her hand again. “Do you want to keep her, Lin?”

The faint chatter of their neighbours, the birds outside the apartment, the wind rustling through the trees; everything seemed to quiet and slow, like the entire world was waiting for her answer.

Against her chest, the baby shifted and sighed.

“I do,” said Lin, and was surprised to feel tears prickling at the corners of her eyes. “I really do.”

Kya smiled, slow and sweet, and the world exhaled for the first time all morning.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading! feedback is very much appreciated :)


End file.
